Bentley removes Wiggins from ASU Board, names replacement

Alabama State University Board of Trustees Vice-Chair Marvin Wiggins talks about his decision to not resign from the board at WVAS Radio Station on the ASU campus in Montgomery, Ala. on Thursday July 24, 2014. (Mickey Welsh / Montgomery Advertiser)

Gov. Robert Bentley Friday removed Judge Marvin Wiggins from the Alabama State University Board of Trustees.

The governor is also expected to call for an ASU board meeting next week to elect new officers. ASU board chairman Elton Dean resigned on Thursday.

Bentley has appointed Ralph Ruggs, director of the Tuscaloosa Housing Authority, to fill Wiggins' position on the board.

Gov. Robert Bentley has appointed Ralph Ruggs, director of the Tuscaloosa Housing Authority, to fill Wiggins' position on the board.(Photo: Tuscaloosa Housing Authority)

In a three-page letter, Bentley cited conflicts of interest Wiggins had over ASU contracts and business, including the hiring of relatives into positions paid for by ASU funding.

Wiggins said in a phone interview Friday afternoon that he planned to challenge his removal from the board, although the path he would choose for that challenge was not yet set.

"We are trying to determine with the attorneys now how we are going to make a challenge," Wiggins said. "We can choose to disregard his letter and force him to take this to (a court) hearing or we can challenge it and try to get an injunction."

The governor said Wiggins "directly benefited" from $30,000 in payments made to Wiggins' wife Zinna to direct Camp Eagle, a two-week summer program. According to a preliminary report from Birmingham-based Forensic Strategic Services, issued last October, Wiggins had other relatives employed in the program.

Bentley also wrote that Wiggins committed "a violation of your duty as Trustee" in not informing the Board that Michelle Crawford, his sister-in-law, had been disbarred in North Carolina in 2008.

Crawford was appointed to a faculty position at ASU in 2011. According to FSS, Crawford was paid $185,000 by the university from July 2010 to December 2012. She pleaded guilty last year to charges related to mortgage fraud in North Carolina.

But Wiggins said Crawford's status as an attorney played no role in her hire as an instructor -- a position Wiggins said she was qualified to hold. Additionally, he challenged the idea that it was his responsibility to be involved in her hiring.

"Where is that a statute or a bylaw -- that I have the responsibility to inform anyone of her past?" Wiggins asked. "When the governor's office brought this up to me they said, 'To much who is given, much is required.' That's scripture. Is that the standard now?"

The governor also cited a move by Wiggins on July 9 to create a $100,000 account to be used by trustees to hire personnel or pay for trips. Dean, the chairman, approved the transfer on June 30, over a week before Wiggins brought the proposal to a meeting of the board's executive committee.

Again, Wiggins said having knowledge that the paperwork had been signed to move the funds was not a violation of bylaws or state statutes.

Bentley said those incidents, combined with threats to the school's accreditation from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS), led to his decision.

"Each of the above incidents or events, standing alone, is sufficient to justify your removal as a Trustee of Alabama State University," Bentley wrote. "Together, they bring to mind the words of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals on September 3, 2013, which stated, 'We are left to speculate who is in charge at ASU.'"

Wiggins dismissed that statement.

"The findings of the FSS report, the Moody's issues and SACS are all the same thing -- they involve my wife's work at the camp and the things about my sister-in-law," Wiggins said. "These are not separate matters. We do not believe -- and we believe we can prove -- that none of this constitutes a conflict of interest or any other violation of state statute that would allow the governor to take this action."

The governor called for the resignation of Wiggins and Dean earlier this week. Dean announced his resignation Thursday; Wiggins, a circuit court judge, said he would not resign.

"By my understanding of the law, I have done nothing to warrant my removal from the board," he said Thursday. "I have done nothing wrong."

State law allows the governor to remove ASU trustees who may be "financially interested in any contract or transaction affecting the university, over conflicts of interest." The governor is also empower to remove trustees who hire relatives or attempt to influence the employment of individuals at ASU outside prescribed procedures.